A Konoha Murder Mystery
by kurzon
Summary: Konoha after a twenty-three year timeskip. Because I couldn't resist the idea of a pink-haired Uchiha detective.
1. Homecoming

Naruto's world and characters belong to Kishimoto Masashi.

Chapter One: Homecoming

There was a time when the faces of six Hokages looked out from the cliff above Konoha. I will never forget the day they collapsed, the fear and confusion, the smell of smoke and rock dust. Shouting. My first day at Academy, there barely ten minutes and hating it so much I wished the sky would fall.

The school building was badly damaged. I could hear Hinata-sensei's voice, calmly calling instructions over the screams and coughs, and distantly the sounds of explosions. The ceiling had fallen on my desk and I was trapped under it, my arm pinned. Wholly convinced I'd caused it all.

I cried out for Hayashi – his class was only next door – and it seemed like magic that straight away the desk was pulled off me. But it was my father, who had after all only just left after the entrance ceremony. His face was set, eyes bloody red, tomoe slowly revolving. "I didn't mean it!" I said, and he shouldn't have understood me but did, and bent to gather me up, murmuring: "You're overestimating yourself," in so warm and kind a voice that I burst into tears and clung. It was years before I talked about it with my mother, was told that Father had always considered school a lesser kind of hell, and had probably wished for it to be destroyed often enough himself.

After that attack they'd left the newly scoured cliff-face bare, so it was a shock to see through the grey dawn haze the symbol of Konoha carved in grand swirling lines. I'd only been away eleven months – I wasn't expecting everything to be the same, but still-.

Some things, though, never change. Hayashi, loose-limbed, stance relaxed, the pink bleached from his close-cropped hair by the thin light. I was three weeks early, had sent no warning, and still Hayashi had known, was here, standing exactly where I'd planned to cross the wall.

"The border guard sent an alert?" I guessed, stopping just out of arm's reach, allowing myself a single glance to confirm that he was whole and unharmed and as fully himself as the last time I'd seen him.

"What need, on mother's birthday?" Hayashi's eyes, as black as my own, reflected his faint smile. "Year's leave or not, there was no chance you would miss it. I've prepared everything."

He headed to the Uchiha compound without another word, marking my return with no more fuss than my departure. My older brother possesses an equilibrium a tsunami couldn't trouble. I took a breath to regain my own, then followed him along the familiar rooftop path to my family's home.

"Flowers," Hayashi said, as I carefully tucked my pack out of the way into a corner of the dining room. The ingredients for our mother's breakfast tray were already laid out on the kitchen bench, and as I headed into the garden Hayashi began assembling the light omelette he had made on the twenty-eighth of March for sixteen years now. His cooking had long surpassed the charred and gluggy effort our mother had bravely swallowed the first time we had celebrated her birthday this way, and the stool he'd required to reach the stove long forgotten, just as I no longer needed to perilously scale the trees to collect the few blooming sprays of Sakura blossom standing out from the tightly-clasped buds.

I arranged the vase before washing off a little of the trail-dust, and by the time I was done Hayashi had the rest of the tray ready, omelette faintly steaming, juice freshly squeezed, the small bowl of yoghurt and cut fruit little resembling the overflowing and half-pulped mess which at four I'd considered such an achievement. Hayashi was well past needing my help to carry the tray, but as usual it was my task to open the door to our parents' bedroom. This short dawn ritual is so set, evolving yet enduring, that I could have been any age, it could have been any year.

Father was awake – we'd never done this without finding him sitting up, impossible to approach unaware. His eyes were open very wide, a storm of hastily-suppressed emotion, for he had been far from happy at my departure, and had long before that been unable to look me in the face without some measure of conflict. But then he smiled - that faint, disarming shift of his mouth which reminded me that my parents adored all their children - and squeezed my mother's shoulder to wake her.

Mother, groggily turning, represented undisputed proof that time had not stood still, for her belly curved out heavily, making her movements awkward. She froze at the sight of me, then let out a breath – almost as if she'd been holding it since the day I left – then opened her arms for me. "Shinrin."

Home has always been my mother's arms, and I knelt on the tatami mat and lost myself in that comfort, gaining as I did so a moment to lock away the distress which came from not even knowing my mother was pregnant. I had done this, separated myself.

"Happy Birthday, okaasan," I whispered, then drew myself back, struggling against the tears I saw in her eyes.

"Happy Birthday," Hayashi echoed and knelt to present her with the tray, knowing as he always did when I wanted attention distracted away from me.

"A wonderful surprise," mother said, which again were ritual words, repeated every year, but this time not referring to the breakfast.

Interruption was heralded by feet thudding lightly along the hall, and Hazakura, dragging Kobai by one arm, slid into the room. "I told you to wake –" he began, but then stopped and gaped a moment before launching himself at me with a cry of: "Nee-san!"

Father deftly removed the breakfast tray to the far side of the bed, as I kept an enthusiastic embrace from landing me in my mother's foreshortened lap. Hazakura is irrepressible. Not my father's reserve, nor the solemnity of any formal ceremony; nothing can dampen his enthusiasm. He likes everyone, assumes everyone likes him, and comes very close to being correct. His colouring shows his bloodline, but it's a common joke in Konoha to say that Hazakura is the least Uchiha Uchiha who has ever drawn breath.

Kobai, on the other hand, is my father's image, and owns the same guarded reticence. I had long been his favourite, and I gave him a faint smile over Hazakura's shoulder, only to have him avert his eyes, mouth turned down. I was not going to be quickly forgiven my desertion, but that is not a bad thing. I had not missed how greatly it troubled father to have Kobai adore me.

"Save your questions," father said, interrupting the flood from Hazakura. "Wish your mother happy, then go fetch your breakfast." He waited until my brothers had obeyed, then looked back at me and said: "Welcome home," and for that moment at least his eyes were purely glad, with no shadow of what had long stood between us.

After my mother had hugged me again, we left our parents to their own morning greetings. Hayashi, who cooks for pleasure, resumed breakfast duties while I collected my sparse pack and found my way to my abandoned bedroom to change.

There is a mirror on the wall which faces the door of my bedroom. For ten years, every time I've walked through this door, closed it behind me, I've stopped and faced myself. There is a photograph hidden behind the glass, a square of fading colour which Kajika discovered mysteriously in old boxes belonging to her father, and which she gave to me because it was an explanation no adult was willing to provide. Four people, eyes and hair Uchiha black. The child my father was once immediately recognisable, face so innocent and joyful. A stern man, my long-dead grandfather, and a woman whose steady gaze spoke of gentle kindness.

And my face, there in that group. A little more angular, the jaw faintly different, mouth a trifle thinner. Uchiha Itachi. My eyes, especially, are his. Murderer, monster, arguably Konoha's hero, but above all my father's beloved brother. The child in that photo looks up at him with the same total adoration Kobai once directed toward me, before I left and lost his trust.

In my early years the resemblance was not so strong, had not become marked until my cheeks had lost their baby's roundness. I don't know when my father first saw his brother in my eyes. In my memory it has always been there, that shadow. He has never shown me anything but a father's love and pride, but I have always seen reflected the memories my face conjures, the pain, love and hatred he will never forget.

My parents think that is the reason I asked Uzumaki-sama for a year's leave, permission to travel. It is at least the reason I cut my waist-length hair, once my secret vanity. Since I saw that photograph, I've worn it nearly as short as Hayashi, because that blunts the resemblance, slightly, not enough.

The true reason I found standing in the kitchen, serious violet eyes widening momentarily at the sight of me. Uzumaki Kajika, best friend, former team member, her white-blonde hair neatly braided, wearing the uniform of Konoha's police force. Another surprise, but perhaps not so great a one. It is, after all, my family's chosen calling.

This early morning visit was nothing to do with me, or my mother's birthday. Kajika was reporting to my father, centre of attention in a room full of family who looked grim even before she said: "Uchiha-sama. We've found another body."

--

Author's Notes:

This is a twenty-three year timeskip. The updates will be fairly slow. Oh, and it's not yuri - sorry yuri-fans.

It's quite possible the names aren't gender-appropriate, but I don't mind. Here are their meanings.

Uchiha Hayashi – forest

Uchiha Shinrin – sacred forest

Uchiha Hazakura – leafing cherry tree

Uchiha Kobai - red plum

Uzumaki Kajika – River frog (lit. river deer)

Uzumaki Huziiro – lavender


	2. Hollow

Naruto's world and characters belong to Kishimoto Masashi.

Chapter Two: Hollow

"Hayashi, take lead on the initial investigation," my father said, then glanced at me. "Go with him. We need a fresh viewpoint on this."

I nodded, grabbing the coat I'd left by the door, and tossing my brother's to him. Mine was unmarked, lacking both the vertically divided white circle which had become the symbol of Konoha's police force and the Uchiha fan which between them declared my brother's place in the world. When my father had re-established the police force, he had been careful to make clear that the clan was a separate entity - not least because he had been a clan of one, and was expanding the police force beyond that, but also because the Rokudaime was very concerned in the wake of attempted coups to avoid Konoha shinobi establishing their own private armies.

An investigation in company of Hayashi and Kajika had not been how I'd intended to spend this morning, but even mother's birthday lost primacy in face of the word 'another'.

"How many?" I asked Hayashi, as we followed Kajika toward the base of Konoha's sheltering cliff.

"This will be the third in a month." Hayashi's voice was uninflected, but I knew he would be far from pleased with the failure that represented. I held back further questions, wanting to view the corpse without preconceptions.

So early in Spring, the chill stayed in the air well into morning. It would keep away the flies, and muted the scent of blood. Kajika led us to the courtyard garden in the centre of the square formed by the hospital buildings, where figures in black waited, their headbands and jackets marked with the white bisected circle of the police. They were turning people away from the taped-off boundary of the garden, but at all the windows above the courtyard there were hands and foreheads pressed against the glass. I felt, tasted at the back of my throat, the angry fear behind all those watching eyes, but fear is a thing I am used to ignoring.

The object of all this interest was lying partially tucked beneath a closely-clipped hedge. A thick-set man, curled away from us so that the most which was visible was his fleshy back. An office-worker, judging from the black trousers and white dress-shirt. No chance of mistaking him for a drunk sleeping off a good night - dried blood caked the sides of the shirt.

"Uchiha-san! Uzumaki-san!" I recognised the officer who saluted, Sensho, and nodded back when he noticed and extended the gesture to include me.

"Report," Hayashi ordered, methodically scanning the entire area before even thinking of approaching. Blood-red eyes, tomoe lazily rotating. Searching for traces of chakra.

"Found by an orderly half an hour ago, sir," Sensho said. "She touched him, trying for a pulse in the throat, but he was cold. Called us straight away, and kept others away. We've secured the area, and Taiko-san is checking on the security arrangements, video surveillance. Hano-san is searching for any other signs of disturbance. Muta-san has been recording visuals of the outer area while we waited." He paused, glancing upward. "We sent for a scene tent."

"Good." The faint approval in Hayashi's voice was enough to make tall, stern Sensho flush faintly. Hayashi has that effect on almost everyone, for all that most of the police force is his senior. I watched, observing without participating, as he paced the perimeter while the assembled officers erected a frame with a simple canvas to shield the corpse.

"How long have you been back?"

Long familiarity let me hear the undernote throbbing in Kajika's voice. Huziiro often said that without him our squad would have been known as Team Ice Queen, but Kajika's usual crisp efficiency could give way to a temper which was far from frozen.

"An hour." I glanced at her, cool profile detached, not a white-blonde hair out of place, violet eyes slowly ticking up to molten furnace. "So you can stay angry for a year."

"Eleven months, one week, two days. Was it too much to say goodbye? Or, damn you, take me with you?"

"I couldn't stop being me if you were there, Jika."

I took several steps away, shifting to get a better view of the corpse as they prepared to move it. One day I hope to be friends with Kajika again, but I still need distance from her. Let her think it was the shadow of Uchiha Itachi which drove me away.

"Turn him," Hayashi ordered, and watched impassively as the curled shape of a man became a grotesquery.

There was only one wound. The white shirt was unbuttoned and trousers loosened, exposing pale chest and belly, faintly shaded with hair. The slash from sternum to groin gaped blackly, opening wide enough for me to see the absence beyond. Hollow. He'd been emptied out like a gourd.

There was no surprise on anyone's face, though more than a little revulsion as the officers stepped back from the figure to allow Muta to record the scene. The man still wore a tie, an incongruous tongue of chequered blue lapping the edge of the wound. I shifted my own sight to search for chakra residue and gazed upward, but there was nothing obvious, and aware of the current limits on my reserves I allowed the sharingan to lapse.

"This is becoming embarrassing, Uchiha-san."

A lanky, whipcord thin man with a bitter cast to his mouth. He was perhaps ten years my senior, though the white of his hair gave him a timeless appearance. There was a long-legged hound at his side, the same pale grey as his eyes, but he didn't resemble the Inuzuka clan or sport their facial markings. The uniform proclaimed him another unexpected new member of the police force, a very confusing one.

"We are trailing badly in someone else's game," Hayashi replied, as ever more interested in solving a problem than covering his pride. "Lend us Yosamu's nose, Hatake-san."

Hatake. I hadn't known any of the Rokudaime's family survived. The newcomer sent his animal forward without any visible command, trotting to within a metre of the corpse, then circling outward, seeking a trail.

"You must be Uchiha Shinrin," the man said. He suppressed his presence well - I'd barely sensed him moving closer. "No-one mentioned your beauty."

It was a double-edged sort of statement, the tone lending a shade of sarcasm. "You have the advantage of me," I said, wondering what kind of point he was trying to make.

"Hatake Kama." He looked down as his hound, Yosamu, bumped against our legs. "I've been told you're even stronger than your brother." He was standing close, a move of dominance, and there was, again, the faintest dissonant note. Challenge? Disbelief?

"Hayashi has always been far stronger," I said, which was true enough so far as I measure strength. The hound was a ninja-dog, most of which were chakra-sensitive, and it seemed Hatake had made a point of measuring mine. Much good that would do him at the moment, or any time. My brother's strength is in invention.

"No result?" Kajika asked, diffidently. I was hard-put not to look sharply at her. Diffidence was not one of Kajika's characteristics.

"Nothing." Hatake crossed to stand with Hayashi by the body. "As with the previous two - no scent trail at all. But no possibility that he died here. Blood on the shirt, practically none underneath him."

"And the body in a location where several hours would pass before it was likely to be discovered, allowing any chakra residue to fade. Yet not truly concealed." Hayashi gazed at the corpse - carcass - a moment longer, then gestured to his officers to transfer it to the plastic sheets spread waiting. Closer examination would take place on the autopsy table. Sensho-san handed him a plastic evidence bag - the contents of the man's pockets - then turned to his particular task of sifting every leaf and blade of grass for any overlooked detail.

"I'll do a circuit of the village," Hatake Kama said. "If only to confirm that again there's no trace of passage. I'll talk to you later, Uchiha-san."

He was looking at me as he spoke, mouth twisted at one corner, but then shifted the expression to a more genuine smile, wryly amused at himself. A nod, and he was gone, Yosamu a shadow slipping at his heels.

"And Hatake Kama is?" I asked Kajika.

"The Rokudaime's son. Perhaps, most likely. Father has accepted him as such, at any rate. He was delivered to us six months ago, so badly injured that even your mother had her doubts of saving him. And claims no memory, a thing which is within the bounds of possibility, if barely." Kajika's voice was dry, but two spots of high colour had appeared in her cheeks and I looked past her directly into my brother's dark eyes to find the quiet compassion he offers to all injured things.

"And then murders start happening? And he is-" There was open disbelief in my voice, and I lowered it, struggling with a sudden reversal of expectations. "And he is part of the investigation team?"

"And makes a nicely obvious suspect," Hayashi said, smiling faintly. "And knows it."

Knows it, resents it, and Kajika plainly had the man far enough under her skin to react as if the edge in his words was directed at her.

"I'd best go report to the Hokage," I told Hayashi.

"Come to headquarters after."

Having bought myself some time to think, my mind did not seem to want to function, so I took the next step in my return to Konoha and went to see the Seventh Hokage.

--

Author's Notes:

Uchiha Hayashi – forest

Uchiha Shinrin – sacred forest

Uchiha Hazakura – leafing cherry tree

Uchiha Kobai - red plum

Uzumaki Kajika – River frog (lit. river deer)

Uzumaki Huziiro – lavender (you see, they were twins, and the first one was a girl, and so Naruto...)

Hatake Kama - scythe (apparently one of the original possibilities for Kakashi's name)

Yosamu - night chill


	3. A Brave Face

Naruto's world and characters belong to Kishimoto Masashi.

Chapter Three: A Brave Face

There was a stack of new manga tucked behind the cup ramen stash. The manga and ramen are something I look for every time I visit the Hokage's office, because I enjoy this hint of the child Uzumaki Naruto once was. My mother has an early team photograph which she keeps framed in my parents' bedroom. Hayate Kakashi, with his hands on the heads of two boys. Between them my mother smiles joyfully, while Kobai's template glowers into the distance, and the round-cheeked boy with a brush of bright blond hair glares at him.

It's sometimes hard to see that boy in the Nanadaime Hokage, this man who loves to laugh, who is impatient with rules and expectations which don't make sense to him, but has such an immense...gravitas, a weight of power and decision and a sense of prices paid, that in his presence I feel painfully young. And he is such a very kind man that I struggle to believe that he once was a virtual outcast in the village.

"Shin-chan," he said, and left his desk to hug me. "Good, your father will stop frowning at me now. Well, less now. Did you find what you were looking for?"

"I don't know," I admitted, and the Hokage tilted me back, hands on my shoulders to give me one of those soul-piercing examinations which could leave even the dullest and most uninteresting feeling exposed.

"Respite, perhaps?" he said, guiding me with a gesture toward the broad balcony which overlooked Konoha. "I miss travelling. Becoming Hokage was like putting down roots. Did you go far?"

"To South Pass."

"Eh? Did they let you in? There's not a tighter border in the world."

I nodded, and since he is my Hokage explained the circumstances, and what that currently meant.

"No missions then. And, Shinrin? Tell me, do you truly in your heart want to be here?"

He reads people so effortlessly. I looked away from those fathomless blue eyes, out over the roofs of the home which I'd once never thought to leave, telling myself again that the things which had puzzled me today should make no difference at all to what I wanted.

"I don't know," I repeated.

#

"Shinrin!"

I dodged, only narrowly avoiding the flying tackle. Six foot two of black haired, violet-eyed male bounced off the corridor wall and contrived to end up sprawled at my feet as if he'd intended to throw himself there. "You're getting faster, Huziiro."

"You don't know the half of it." He grinned up at me merrily. "Next time, no warning."

"That's no way to welcome a friend home, Huziiro." Hinata-sensei stepped over her son and hugged me warmly. "It's good to see you, Shinrin-chan. Your mother must be so pleased."

I chatted to Hinata-sensei for a couple of minutes, as ever marvelling that someone so quiet could cope with Huziiro's boisterousness, or Kajika's lightning rages. But although Hinata-sensei has always seemed to actively dislike conflict, a single word from her is enough to end any argument in the Uzumaki household. The twins are wildly protective of her in return: the only thing I've ever seen make Huziiro behave as if a day's events were not an elaborate entertainment for his benefit was a threat to Uzumaki Hinata.

Huziiro conveniently trailed me after I made my farewells. Although many are deceived by his surface attitude, Huziiro's by no means a simple or unperceptive person, so I asked: "What is this Hatake Kama to Kajika?"

He laughed, and stopped tugging his hair into its cultivated spikes. "Damn, I've missed your directness. In theory nothing but an assignment. In practice, so far under her skin he might as well have her on a leash – she can't stay away from him. It was funny until people started dying."

"Assignment?"

"Settling him in, training partner while he was recovering, trying to help him remember something of use. Interrogator with a velvet glove, and both of them practically panting at each other as they vied for the upper hand." He caught my confused frown, and said: "Oh, not playing your brother false, if that's what you're thinking. That fizzled within a month. I think it's down to you and me if the Four-Clan Monster is ever to be spawned."

I ignored his wicked grin, looking toward police headquarters. A familiar tightening at the back of my neck warned that stress and confusion was edging me toward a headache, and I deepened my breathing to push it away. "What's your view on Hatake?"

"For a man with no memory, he has a huge chip on his shoulder about Konoha. Kick-ass shinobi, and as likely to be the Rokudaime's son as the next guy. Not a clue as to whether or not he guts civilians for a hobby. I don't dislike the man, but if I called him sharp, it wouldn't only be a compliment. Thorny bastard. Jika hadn't actually climbed into bed with him before these murders started, but he's not above twisting the knife as thanks for her taking a step back while the investigation's underway. Be a good little Uchiha genius and solve these murders so Jika's current start goes back to being entertaining."

I had to smile. "Too cruel and you'll get no sympathy when you're entertaining in turn, Huziiro."

"Oh, hell no. There's not a woman on the planet - present company excepted of course. I'll be breaking hearts into my dotage."

And planning to enjoy every second, knowing Huziiro.

"Ah! Has anyone told you? The best thing happened at the beginning of Winter. Hanabi oba-chan got Neji-sensei drunk and had her wicked way with him. I guess enough sake will remove the rod from anyone's ass. We're getting a special bonus cousin as a result."

That was news. "Your grandfather must be-"

"Livid. Beyond words. We're not supposed to even admit that she's knocked up until after they're married."

"When's the wedding?"

"That's the best part! Neji-sensei got himself assigned to a deep cover mission straight after, isn't due back until next fortnight. He doesn't even know. Hyuugas are almost as good at running away as Uchihas." Laughing, Huziiro skipped out of reach at the entrance of the police building. "So glad you're back in time for our team reunion. If you ever want to tell me why you left, you know where I live. I have lots of sake."

With a final wave, Huziiro headed down the street. As furious at me as his sister, but never for a moment would he show that anything could hurt him. I watched the crowd part before his long, confident stride, then looked up at the bisected white circle which was meant to represent truth revealed.

Hollowed-out corpses. I would make myself think of them, at least until the ground had stopped shifting beneath my feet.

--

Author's Notes:

Uchiha Hayashi – forest

Uchiha Shinrin – sacred forest

Uchiha Hazakura – leafing cherry tree

Uchiha Kobai - red plum

Uzumaki Kajika – River frog (lit. river deer)

Uzumaki Huziiro – lavender (you see, they were twins, and the first one was a girl, and so Naruto...)

Hatake Kama - scythe (apparently one of the original possibilities for Kakashi's name)

Yosamu - night chill


End file.
